besom
/ˈbiː.zəm/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: 1.50 in modern English
9
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
2
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
Example Sentences
- "As a kid I went to the Russian Bath with my own father. … Down in the cellar men moaned on the steam-softened planks while they were massaged abrasively with oak-leaf besoms lathered in pickle buckets."
- "At Ickwell Green, in Bedfordshire, there is a permanent maypole. There, the May Queen is accompanied by moggies (raggedly dressed women) carrying besoms - birch-twig brooms."
- ""Eh, but she was a besom, if a' tales be true !""
- "Janet's eyes began to look dim, and I had to frown at her very hard; then I had to turn my frown on Jean ... and Janet, the besom, took advantage of my divided attention."
- "Uncle Angus went on about the behavior of the car. "She's a besom, a proper besom, her and her gears. She'll be the death of me yet one of these days.""
- ""She's a besom but no' bad at times, like now," Agnes said as she bit into a dough-ring."
Etymology
From Middle English besme, beseme, from Old English besma, besema (“besom, broom, rod”), from Proto-West Germanic *besmō (“broom”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: *bʰes-, besme, besma, *besmō